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Friday, February 28, 2014

Several locations of Gator's Dockside, a restaurant chain here in Central Florida, have posted notices on the doors, every table, and even in the bathrooms that they are charging customers an extra "fee" for the Affordable Healthcare Act. They claimed they are doing this so they can afford to comply with the ACA and provide healthcare for their employees.

I heard about this story a few days ago, but didn't write about it because it just didn't seem like a big scandal to me. 1% of a fifty dollar meal is fifty cents. If that's what it costs to bring healthcare to all your employees, by all means, take my two freaking quarters.

I decided to give the owners the benefit of the doubt that they were doing this for the employees and not as a political ploy. I did think it odd they would put a seperate line item on the bill just for ACA. Afterall, they don't do this for Social Security, Medicaid, or any assortment of expenses they had--so why single out ACA except to make customers mad? But again, I gave them the benefit of the doubt because they were providing their employees healthcare.

Then I learned that independent franchisees (outside of the restaurants in GOP strangleholds, like the infamous and creepy "The Villages") weren't participating. They essentially told the media it was unnecessary and stupid.

Though the restaurant blames the new surcharge on Obamacare, the employer mandate, which will require Gator’s Dockside to provide coverage to 70 percent of its full-time employees, actually won’t go into effect until 2015.

OK. So it IS unnecessary and stupid. So they are charging customers for something they aren't even paying.

It's starting to look like a political stunt. (The Heritage Foundation and other right-wing sites ate it up). Several customers took to their facebook page to complain.

But I said to myself, hey, at least Gator's Dockside is taking care of their employees.

1 comment
:

"I decided to give the owners the benefit of the doubt that they were doing this for the employees and not as a political ploy. I did think it odd they would put a seperate line item on the bill just for ACA. Afterall, they don't do this for Social Security, Medicaid, or any assortment of expenses they had--so why single out ACA except to make customers mad?"

Absolutely correct. There is no reason to do so. All they had to do was quietly increase prices on even just a few popular items. It's nothing but a sham demonstration.